Over more than 200 analyses, this newsletter has built a set of named frameworks for reading China tech. They started as shorthand inside individual articles. Over time they became the toolbox: recurring structures that explain why a funding round, an IPO, or a product launch behaves the way it does.
One thing separates this toolbox from generic industry analysis. These frameworks were not imported from strategy textbooks and applied to China. Each one was extracted from a specific mechanism inside China’s tech system: how the state architects markets, how coordination compresses time, how listings engineer scarcity, how procurement substitutes for benchmarks. To understand the framework is to understand the mechanism. That is the point of this index. A few of the frameworks turned out to travel beyond China, and where that is true, the entry says so plainly.
Each entry gives the idea in one line, names the piece of China’s system it captures, says when to apply it, and links the articles that built it. Where a framework carries a live, falsifiable test, the entry names it.
Two notes on scope. First, the six field-level principles are not repeated here. They live in The China Tech Field Guide, which is free and covers the top of the stack. This index works one level down, at the tools I reach for while writing. Second, the index is alive. New frameworks are added as they earn their place, roughly every two months, and entries are updated when the evidence moves.
Here is the full toolbox, twenty frameworks in five groups:
Capital and valuations: The Scarcity Trap · The Perpetual Raise · Denominator Skepticism · The Consensus Machine · Sell-First vs Build-First · Geopolitical Arbitrage and the Two Walls
Compute and chips: The Credential Economy · Token Export · The Token Factory Test · The Sanctions Paradox
Tokens and AI economics: The Token Hangover and Cost per Completed Task · The Seat Outlives the Agent · Harness Engineering · The Siphon Effect
Platforms and interfaces: The Two Tencents · The Infrastructure Trap · The Do-Engine
Hardware businesses: The Two-Week Wall · The Chip Bag Test · Collect From Both Ends
One entry follows in full, so you can see what the format delivers. I chose the one whose prediction has already been settled in public.
This index is a founding-member reference at Hello China Tech, independent analysis of China’s AI, semiconductor, robotics, and EV sectors, built on Chinese-language primary sources. The best place to start is free: selected analyses each month, including The China Tech Field Guide.
The Scarcity Trap
From: Zhipu and the Scarcity Trap (February 2026) · Reused in: Zhipu Bet Everything on One Equation, Moonshot Sells the Right to Say No, CXMT’s 466% Debut on a 6.73% Float
The idea in one line: When a sliver of free float lets concentrated buying set the price for every share outstanding, the valuation is a price of scarcity, not of the business. Lock-up expiries put that scarcity on a timer.
What it reveals about China’s system: Float engineering. Chinese listing structures routinely bring single-digit floats to market, with cornerstone allocations and lock-up schedules printed in the filings. The rally and its reversal are both written into the share register before trading starts.
Use it when: a Chinese listing posts an extreme post-IPO rally on a single-digit float, and the unlock dates are already printed.
Where it stands: Round one is settled. The February piece flagged Zhipu’s 8.5% float; both Zhipu and MiniMax fell in July’s unlock week, then placed more than HK$40bn combined. The mechanics moved to CXMT: unlocks in January and July 2027, the second one roughly five times the opening float.